Something others haven't mentioned (or if they did, I missed it) which I feel is important is this:

A player who expects to receive far more than they are willing to give isn't worth effort.

That may sound harsh, but it plays into the concept of that the responsibility of providing entertainment and enjoyment doesn't fall solely on the shoulders of leaders, it falls on everyone involved. Unless the group has some sort of rule which forbids members from creating and running plots/events for the group (which I've seen, but never understood), the answer to a player who says they're bored is "What kind of event or plot would you like to run to alleviate your boredom?"

Okay, some players just feel they don't have the mind or energy to host something. Personally, I think that's cop-out nonsense most of the time, but there are some people who just genuinely lack the confidence to even make the attempt. For players like that, you have to watch whether or not they participate in what others are putting out there, because even someone who doesn't run anything but does show up and support the activities others provide is still being a valuable team player.

If a player neither hosts events nor routinely participates in them, cut them lose and move on. Don't even feel bad about it, don't second-guess it, your time and effort have value and your energy is finite. Don't bother with a 1:1 conversation to ask them why they aren't, and to try and psychology them... most roleplayers seem to favor placation and confrontation-avoidance, so you're likely to get a lot of praise and promises of support which end up moot (I've almost never seen this kind of thing end up resulting in any permanent change from the player - they may show up once or twice, but then go right back to how they were).

It's tough to lead. Sometimes you'll have whole swaths of people wander away at once, and usually for reasons which don't even make logical sense and hurt your feelings and confidence in the process. The hard truth is, most of us roleplay because we have terrible social skills. People who have good social skills have actual social lives rather than digital ones. There'll probably be a few people who will read that and get immediately angry, but hey, I'm not excluding myself. The lot of us, we're all strange hermits, each with our own cocktail of anxieties and neuroses, and successfully trying to get any of us to do anything useful together can be a bit like herding cats through a field of catnip. Any small amount of cooperative effort and results is almost miraculous if you think about it, so don't beat yourself up too badly if things seem tough. Just kinda the nature of the beast, I guess.

This player has a sense of humor. If the content of the post suggests otherwise, please err on the side of amusement and friendship, because that's almost certainly the intent. We're all on the same team: Team Roleplayer! Have a smile, have a chuckle, and have a slice of pie. Isn't pie great?

I have an issue of not being able to log on without six people grabbing me by each one of my limbs and running in a different direction. Shit's overwhelming and I don't even lead the majority of our events. Or many at all anymore. BUT I DO lead a small RP FC/discord/linkshell, my opinions just for yooou.

-ECHOING THAT.. large scale events are difficult and everyone wants to be the center of attention. But only the 'officers' or 'leaders' get to have their time to shine. This is why people often couple up and do small itty bitty "slice of life" plots. Make small events so everyone feels important. Exclusive, detailed events make people really excited. I find people really enjoy IC dungeons, even if they're unsynced and you don't even complete the dungeon. Just the different setting is better than the usual 'world' setting where anyone can happen upon you. Make several events if the numbers are large so everyone gets a chance.. and that leads me to my next point.

-Share the burden, you don't always have to lead. Let other people make events, encourage them to make events. I mean since the last event was about their character, they get to lead the next one and OH MY GOD ARE YOU EVER EXCITED TO SEE WHAT HAPPENS NEXT. YOU'RE SO STOKED. (Well you should be, I usually am.) Share notes later on what happened. Share notes IC, make the information sharing an event. People absolutely love it when events aren't always about one character. Also, YOU CANNOT PRAISE THE PERSON WHO MADE THE EVENT ENOUGH. YES CAPS. CAPS. PRAISE. LOVE. SHOWER. AFFECTION. It's so much work you didn't want to do, and they did it! If you had fun, let them know. Remind them how much fun you had the next day, the next week, next month.

-No kidnapping Sasuke. He never wanted to be with you guys anyways, he's glad he's gone. If you get him back he's just going to get kidnapped again next week. Don't bother. Let him go. He'll come back when he's ready. Seriously kidnapping RP in general is ALWAYS A SHITSHOW unless it's an npc, and even then it's usually a shitshow. I have no fucking idea what it is with 'dark RP' and kidnapping but it seems to be the same slew of character types being kidnapped all the goddamn time, every time. It's especially bad if it's a PvP kidnapping and not a PvNPC kidnapping. Two RP groups stretching a character like a goddamn stretch armstrong is boring and we've all RP'd this exact same plot at least 30 times in our time RPing on mmos. We're sick of it. Even if it's 'well done' and the 'outcome' is already thought of ahead of time, 9/10 of us are rolling our eyes and holding our heads whimpering, WHY?

-Join other linkshells and be part of other events, don't lead everything all the time. Even if you don't like their events, you can see EXACTLY what you don't like and what people DO like. There ARE secret societies of RPers out there who aren't just sitting in taverns.

-Not everyone gets to be the strongest. Not everyone gets to be the smartest. Not everyone gets to be the best at everything, period. I find the biggest difficulty in adding more people to my group, is that we find new characters who happen to be the absolute best at everything and therefore contribute.. not much. These type of characters are just as bad as the socialite-only types and make what could otherwise be an amazing plot, boring and predictable. They can't lose. They can't be hurt. They don't want to /roll. There is no conflict, even if there is, because they always win. I have NEVER been able to succeed with telling someone their character is this way.

I honestly don't really believe that there's socialite only RPers, just RPers who are unwilling to do certain plots because they just don't fit for them IC or OOC.. so they pass on it. I have never ever met a tavern-ONLY character. Even the character(s) I ONLY see in the Quicksand often have neat adventure stories to share with my character. Appealing to people is difficult and the most important thing is your fun-per-second. Even if the character isn't a fighter, maybe the character's just a chubby potion making nerd and they need some extra special herbs that grow in a rare place and they can't get there on their own? Are they gonna sit in a tavern and magically buy npc herbs? Or would they rather go on an epic adventure if the opportunity presents itself? Usually they take the epic adventure, if they get the chance. Even a bartender character who's retired will step up and go out if there's a good reason to do it. SO not only have events got to appeal to other people's fun-per-second, they also have to make logical sense. The more people you add, the more complicated it gets.

Hope I helped a little, even if ...some people might actually LIKE kidnapping RP.

We actually banned kidnapping in our overarching plots because so many people wanted to be kidnapped and it was getting exhausting XD. We don't get a say when people do their own personal stories or one-offs so it still happens quite a bit.

On "Stories shouldn't revolve around one person". If you CAN, you should make a story that doesn't really have a main character at all. Nothing from anyone's backstory (Unless it's a shared backstory with more people involved). You can have people who can be integral at the START to get it off the ground (Then let the story be free to go toward whoever grabs for it) but none of them should be the single focus of the plotline. I know this can't be avoided all the time (Hell, we're guilty of this right now) but it's good to START with a more neutral plot line that anyone can jump into without having to know <insert character here>. Once trust is established, you can absolutely branch off into more personal storylines.

On "One-offs are better". I think that really depends on the RPer. There are a lot of people in my guild who really like long, overarching plots and there are some who don't really have time for that and can't participate, and some even still who don't like keeping track of the madness and just wanna punch some baddies sometimes. If you're looking to do the first thing, I suggest actually doing BOTH. It's actually really easy to put one-off plots within your overarcing storyline. Lets say your bad guy uh... We'll call him Bob, is threatening to do SOMETHING with some ancient artifact that may hurt Eorzea! But you don't know much on what that artifact is! What do you do? A one-off dungeon run into the great Library to look for info may be the best bet OR if you have more time - a one-off roll20 into some ancient ruins to find more information. Then you find more info on how to stop Bob, but alas you don't have the right pieces to make thing you need! And the pieces are illegal and hard to find in Eorzea! You can then do a one-off about smuggling the pieces in.
These are all things that would work separately ("Finding info on artifacts" "Smuggle in goods") without a plot, so people without a lot of time or inclination CAN participate, but they also circle back to your overarcing plotline for those more deeply involved. These aren't events you have to run either, if you have some active members they may just volunteer to run it and ask you what they would find when they do. A lot of one-offs my guild does are run by other people who want to help find answers... though you may not get to many people volunteering at the start.

(01-02-2017 05:21 PM)ExAtomos Wrote: Then that may be, in fact, all they want to do. Perhaps tap a reliable FC member to head up these type of social events that don't interest you personally. Let them have fun with it.

I've actually run into the wall of 'social' crime based rp myself recently with a new LS I've joined. My dude isn't just gonna go to a tavern and declare "teehee, I'm a bad guy" just to see who reaches out to me. That... makes zero sense. lol. In my opinion, this type of rp doesn't lend itself to large scale, social events. One on one or small group? Sure! But we both better have a good reason for speaking to each other about Nefarious Stuff tm.

I can't speak for you and your FC members specifically, but I like tossing out RP hooks either oocly (which sadly, usually don't get responses) or over an IC LS with something along the lines of... *Jo's voice sounds pained as she whispers frantically over the linkshell.* Is... is anyone there? I need help... please, gods... send help." /drama Often you'll get people springing from the woodwork for this.

If some folks in your FC just never interact with the rest and it's like a rock in your shoe, speak with them privately. See what they want from the FC and, if there is just a great wall of a mismatch, suggest they seek another group that may fit their rp style better.

Hope this helps! ^^

(01-02-2017 05:21 PM)zaviire Wrote: I guess I should clarify that in my case it is actually an LS. I don't lead the FC I'm a member of (though I guess some of this advice would be helpful to me in that regard too because I'm an officer there). Actually, the LS I lead is probably the one you're referring to here... Trust me, as a leader, I'm really frustrated with the general atmosphere here because... Yeah. I intend to hand off social-planning responsibilities to people who actually like doing those things (not that I hate them; I just want something different for the group overall), but getting people to step up to the plate and do that is a whole 'nother can of worms. Maybe I'm just not trying hard enough...

But yes this helps! I'll probably start trying to toss some more IC hooks into the LS soon,and get my officers to do the same; the hooks that set up the combat test minievent were pretty good and seemed to stir up some interest in addition to introducing what could easily become an arc for the LS in general, so I'll see if I can get more of that in particular going...

Yes... SOMEHOW I missed your sig completely. lol XD

Ok, so from the inside (albeit only very recently)... I'm struggling to find a way in. I can't yet tell what direction y'all are steering the boat, especially since lately there have been a couple "we're doing it this way now" posts. You also have... quite the mixed bag of members. I certainly appreciate your struggle to try and change the RP style of the LS from lore-breaking silliness to actually dark RP with substance while still keeping members that you've had the whole time.

I've spent years now leading a large FC and then a large LS here and have tried to cat-herd RPers who all have different philosophies of how to go about it and what style of RP they like. I've met maybe a dozen who actually mesh well enough with my way of RPing that it's as easy as breathing when we hang out. The rest... it's the gamut between feeling like I'm pulling teeth to make this conversation happen to just sheer indifference towards the plot I offer. (And that's okay!)(I mean, it sucks. lol. But I understand why. xD )

I'm actually feeling a bit of the <Hmm.> with the LS recently. You have put so much work into these upcoming plots and I was really impressed with the google doc you created. But frankly, this structured, planned style of RP isn't for me. As an aside, back on my old JP server, we had two hardcore rpers and a few interested in the concept in my FC. Unfortunately, me and the other rper had vastly different styles of going about it. He preferred the structured sort with a definite beginning and end, pulled in specific tasks that exist in game (and we had to do them), and created these beautiful websites to go along with it. There was little chance for character development. I wanted a more natural, 'met by chance', 'let the plot happen as we talk' style of rp interaction. Most importantly in this case, as soon as I see "we are using X roll/character sheet system", I stop reading and move on. I would expect folks who prefer structure to feel the same about my more fluid way of setting up scenes.

I've done what I can in the LS chat itself. My character is a fence, caravan guard and sometimes raider (trying to retire from that and settle down) and I've oocly stated as much. If no one needs ill-gotten merchandise taken off their hands or some shipment needs to go 'missing', then there's not much I can do to get involved. I will keep trying though (cause I'm stubborn that way) and will find an 'in' at some point. (Hell, I've even got plots ready to go about treasure hunters finding some sort of artifact they really shouldn't have unearthed, what they should do now that they have it, and basically chew on my pc monitor thinking about all the horrible things that could happen. XD )

This does make me wonder though... in amongst the dozen Discord channels y'all have, do you have a space for members to give a brief run down of their character(s) so we can potentially find reasons to meet each other?

eta now that I've quit being lazy and read all the comments (including the above which made me laugh since I have an 'evil artifact' plot in the wings. XD ):

Some things I've learned:

I think most players want you to be Netflix. They don't want to be an active participant in a plot, much less a proactive one. They want to WATCH the damn plot unfold. They just want everything handed to them. And when you finally give up the IC nudges and ask them OOCly what their character is doing; they respond with "Oh, I'm supposed to tell you?"

Piggy backing off that... Annoyingly, my most successful plots have centered around my character(s) just due to the fact that I can keep the story moving instead of logging in and praying that others will contribute to a group RP plot so that it keeps going.

Some folks just ain't gonna like the plot. ; ; And none of you may know this until things get rolling.

There are a lot of RP styles between pure SoL and structured events. I vastly prefer nuanced dark themes and, while my RP appears to be more casual like SoL encounters, there's a heap of potential plots that I pull from to toss into the conversations with my RP partners. The story will unfold as we continue to interact. If they move on or show little interest, I pocket the idea right back and will adjust it or use it in another way some other time. Flexibility is key.

My general advice is to make ooc announcements and reminders to people constantly. This is really helpful to RPers who don't hang out at the FC house or have just logged on. A quick: ((Hey, we're doing the DRAGON EXPLODING event at <pos>)) ((everyone's RPing at the Gold Saucer if you're interested)) when someone logs on can really hook people in who might not know an event is going on at the moment or if they're invited to join in on it.

(01-05-2017 12:16 PM)ExAtomos Wrote: ...do you have a space for members to give a brief run down of their character(s) so we can potentially find reasons to meet each other?

As an outsider looking in, and as someone who's been in these sort of groups before (be they themed FC's or themed LS's), I can tell you that "I don't know who these other characters are and what they could do for my character" is one of the most significant potential hurdles that members can have in reaching out to each other for RP.

Say you have a thief and a fence. If the thief doesn't advertise over open channels that they've stolen some rare gems and are now looking to get rid of them for a tidy sum of gil (advertising is a risky proposition to begin with, could get stung) and the fence doesn't advertise that they're a point of contact within the black market who could easily manage such a transaction (again, risky proposition), then that face-to-face and that business deal are not likely to happen.

This goes for OoC as much as it does for IC. As the player of a thief character, I might not think to turn to [Insert Name Here] Linkshell as somewhere to trade goods for coin if I'm not OoCly aware that [Insert Name Here] has a number of fences among its pearl-holders.

-Share the burden, you don't always have to lead. Let other people make events, encourage them to make events. I mean since the last event was about their character, they get to lead the next one and OH MY GOD ARE YOU EVER EXCITED TO SEE WHAT HAPPENS NEXT. YOU'RE SO STOKED. (Well you should be, I usually am.) Share notes later on what happened. Share notes IC, make the information sharing an event. People absolutely love it when events aren't always about one character. Also, YOU CANNOT PRAISE THE PERSON WHO MADE THE EVENT ENOUGH. YES CAPS. CAPS. PRAISE. LOVE. SHOWER. AFFECTION. It's so much work you didn't want to do, and they did it! If you had fun, let them know. Remind them how much fun you had the next day, the next week, next month.

[snip]

Not gonna lie I get super excited for others' events -- usually more excited for theirs than my own when it comes to stories... Since when I write stories I need to overwork myself by accounting for everything. I'm not sure how to exactly go about encouraging people to make events though sadly beyond constantly plugging the ones they advertise in our events and announcements channel and encouraging them practically every other breath to feel absolutely free to get stuff going for themselves or even just try to suck the LS in general into whatever they happen to be doing. It's difficult to get stoked and sing praises about people who plan their own things or even help me plan things when I'm only ever the one involved in planning, unfortunately...

Aside: I'll admit I laughed pretty hard at the kidnapping Sasuke thing. I'm not a huge fan of kidnapping RP; I'm not sure what the fascination is and I guess it could work in smaller plots but most of what I heard about it just locks a character in a damsel in distress position... Which needless to say is kind of boring and overused imo. Tropes Are Not Bad and all that, but when it comes to writing... Eh. I've participated in one event with my FC where it worked, but that was mostly because the 'kidnapping' happened as a result of our failure to win a combat instance (and it was NPCvP) and carried weight because of that. And the character died as a result, so I guess it doesn't really qualify because it wasn't and couldn't have ended up as a chronic thing.

(01-03-2017 05:51 AM)ArmachiA Wrote: On "Stories shouldn't revolve around one person". If you CAN, you should make a story that doesn't really have a main character at all. Nothing from anyone's backstory (Unless it's a shared backstory with more people involved). You can have people who can be integral at the START to get it off the ground (Then let the story be free to go toward whoever grabs for it) but none of them should be the single focus of the plotline. I know this can't be avoided all the time (Hell, we're guilty of this right now) but it's good to START with a more neutral plot line that anyone can jump into without having to know <insert character here>. Once trust is established, you can absolutely branch off into more personal storylines.

On "One-offs are better". I think that really depends on the RPer. There are a lot of people in my guild who really like long, overarching plots and there are some who don't really have time for that and can't participate, and some even still who don't like keeping track of the madness and just wanna punch some baddies sometimes. If you're looking to do the first thing, I suggest actually doing BOTH. It's actually really easy to put one-off plots within your overarcing storyline. Lets say your bad guy uh... We'll call him Bob, is threatening to do SOMETHING with some ancient artifact that may hurt Eorzea! But you don't know much on what that artifact is! What do you do? A one-off dungeon run into the great Library to look for info may be the best bet OR if you have more time - a one-off roll20 into some ancient ruins to find more information. Then you find more info on how to stop Bob, but alas you don't have the right pieces to make thing you need! And the pieces are illegal and hard to find in Eorzea! You can then do a one-off about smuggling the pieces in.
These are all things that would work separately ("Finding info on artifacts" "Smuggle in goods") without a plot, so people without a lot of time or inclination CAN participate, but they also circle back to your overarcing plotline for those more deeply involved. These aren't events you have to run either, if you have some active members they may just volunteer to run it and ask you what they would find when they do. A lot of one-offs my guild does are run by other people who want to help find answers... though you may not get to many people volunteering at the start.

Yep, that first point is basically my philosophy when it regards storylines. Because I have a bit of trouble getting invested in plots that aren't tied to any characters at all (a villain that's just like, a giant space flea from nowhere... Is difficult for me to be invested in so I tend not to write them; when other people write them there's other ways for me to get into the story so I don't concern myself with the antagonist much until I'm in the moment) I tend to use my characters as instigators, but quickly send the story shooting off into a lot of other branching directions, so even if my characters kick-start the story they don't stay in the limelight for very long. XD I've only GM'd a total of one storyline so far on a totally different character and wit ha totally different cast, with an upcoming second, but even in terms of just general RP with my partners that hardly even constitute events, I prefer to play supporting/instigating roles and let others bask in the limelight.

Doing one-off events that build toward the greater story is definitely something I'm going to try, though, because it gives more people the chance to get involved in the story and I can only handle so many people at a time because I'm a beginner at best and a know-nothing at worst but I still want to work anyone who's interested in being in... Well, in, and i think it's important to at least try to be inclusive of people unless they just like, totally won't work with you at all, like they're expressing interest OOC in a very general way but refuse or neglect to get to the more pointed stuff that would help to... Solve whatever issue they have, or the issue happens to have to do with the structure or setting of the story and it's like... I'm sorry there's... There's only so much I can do without re-planning the scenario entirely... (Which I don't honestly even plan that much; mostly I just plan the beginnings and let people go from there, but beginnings usually serve to set the stage, so...)

Ok, so from the inside (albeit only very recently)... I'm struggling to find a way in. I can't yet tell what direction y'all are steering the boat, especially since lately there have been a couple "we're doing it this way now" posts. You also have... quite the mixed bag of members. I certainly appreciate your struggle to try and change the RP style of the LS from lore-breaking silliness to actually dark RP with substance while still keeping members that you've had the whole time.

[snip]

I'm actually feeling a bit of the <Hmm.> with the LS recently. You have put so much work into these upcoming plots and I was really impressed with the google doc you created. But frankly, this structured, planned style of RP isn't for me. As an aside, back on my old JP server, we had two hardcore rpers and a few interested in the concept in my FC. Unfortunately, me and the other rper had vastly different styles of going about it. He preferred the structured sort with a definite beginning and end, pulled in specific tasks that exist in game (and we had to do them), and created these beautiful websites to go along with it. There was little chance for character development. I wanted a more natural, 'met by chance', 'let the plot happen as we talk' style of rp interaction. Most importantly in this case, as soon as I see "we are using X roll/character sheet system", I stop reading and move on. I would expect folks who prefer structure to feel the same about my more fluid way of setting up scenes.

[snip]

This does make me wonder though... in amongst the dozen Discord channels y'all have, do you have a space for members to give a brief run down of their character(s) so we can potentially find reasons to meet each other?

eta now that I've quit being lazy and read all the comments (including the above which made me laugh since I have an 'evil artifact' plot in the wings. XD ):

Some things I've learned:

I think most players want you to be Netflix. They don't want to be an active participant in a plot, much less a proactive one. They want to WATCH the damn plot unfold. They just want everything handed to them. And when you finally give up the IC nudges and ask them OOCly what their character is doing; they respond with "Oh, I'm supposed to tell you?"

Piggy backing off that... Annoyingly, my most successful plots have centered around my character(s) just due to the fact that I can keep the story moving instead of logging in and praying that others will contribute to a group RP plot so that it keeps going.

Some folks just ain't gonna like the plot. ; ; And none of you may know this until things get rolling.

There are a lot of RP styles between pure SoL and structured events. I vastly prefer nuanced dark themes and, while my RP appears to be more casual like SoL encounters, there's a heap of potential plots that I pull from to toss into the conversations with my RP partners. The story will unfold as we continue to interact. If they move on or show little interest, I pocket the idea right back and will adjust it or use it in another way some other time. Flexibility is key.

Hahah, it happens! I should probably think about sprucing up my sig now that I'm trying to actively participate in forums and stuff but... Meh.

Ahah, seems our styles are pretty opposite then. While I definitely don't enjoy plots that are completely and totally planned out from start to finish, I really really hate trying to make anything meaningful out of the little social interactions and characters more or less just getting to know each other; most of the time it feels more like trying to pull teeth than writing a story that would ever have a logical conclusion. So I tend to plan beginnings to try and hook people in and give the story event a general direction and turn people loose. It's mostly because of preference; I find it a lot easier to get invested in plotlines when my ideas are laid out in a semi-logical order and the 'background lore'/justification for the event happening is established, because participating in others' events I know I've had trouble getting invested specifically because I went in blind and ended up never really getting a reason for my character to be invested in the story IC or a reason for me to care OOC... so I dropped it and retconned it, because my character ended up never finding a reason to be there and I don't like having a lot of fluff lining my stories.

We didn't used to have a channel for that because it doesn't seem like something most people are totally interested in; most of the applications we get don't link to a tumblr or RPC page and they don't tend to talk about it a whole lot so I assume that's because people don't want any information about what their character does to be public for whatever reason even if it would help OOC with figuring out how characters fit into the grand scheme, just as a general thing. But I made one anyway just now because it seems like a good idea because being able to easily refer back to character information is important!

But yeah, I'm definitely feeling a little bit like Netflix given that even though the upcoming story is the only one I've gone out of my way to plan... The various socials we've held have borne no fruit with regards to stories or connections, even when one of the ones long before the Holiday season began was framed as a chance to basically sell your skills and get jobs out of the network because... IC, that's what it's for. the nature of the network isn't strictly insider info or anything. (Maybe 5 people showed up outside of myself, despite scheduling it about two to three weeks in advance. A tavern night held by one of our members later that same month rounded up about 20 of our members in the same room. Gee, I wonder where their priorities are...)

Aside: I'd debate that we've ever broken lore to a major degree as a group; the main issue in my opinion lies in social RP since in my experience social RP has hardly done anything to further a plot or make something happen. It probably goes better for other people in general but all it's really gotten for me is naptime, screwed up character arcs, and talking about the weather... Mostly the latter, especially when it comes to the social events I've tried my best to organize. Events which make me feel as if people have not read up on the lore of the LS at all, which is kind of saddening.

How do you go about getting people more involved with the story-based side of RP that you intended for a group from the beginning? Be it with planning stuff of their own or getting them involved with stuff that the leadership organizes?

How do you #StopTheSocials 2k17?

I provide this advice with the following caveats:

I engage people through a linkshell rather than an FC, so ensuring that all members are engaged is not 100% necessary.

I use a lot of dice, so some of the advice I have would be "use an interesting dice system that lets people feel like their characters are contributing in unique ways and still allows for consequences." If your first reaction to the word "dice" was an urge to take my lunch money, you can disregard that.

Setting those aside, I tend to engage people by making multiple small events in which they can participate that gradually build up to a larger storyline. By "small," I mean groups of about 3 to 6, not including myself as DM. I try to avoid rescheduling these events when possible. People show up or don't. This has the benefit of ensuring that players show up based on when they can, not solely based on who they know will also be in the event, and pushes together people who would otherwise be unfamiliar with each other.

I also make sure there is some sort of tangible consequence for these events. Part of why I emphasize a system above is that this can be difficult to measure in freeform RP. If they screw an event up - and they should completely be able to do so - you will need to make it clear that action mattered and had some consequence on the FC that will then need to be resolved.

Outside of these events, I do not care what the characters do in their offtime. They can slice-of-life it up all they like. They can be involved in stuff completely unrelated to what I am doing. As far as I am concerned, if they are showing up to some events and participating, they are engaged enough.

(01-05-2017 09:50 PM)zaviire Wrote: We didn't used to have a channel for that because it doesn't seem like something most people are totally interested in; most of the applications we get don't link to a tumblr or RPC page and they don't tend to talk about it a whole lot so I assume that's because people don't want any information about what their character does to be public for whatever reason even if it would help OOC with figuring out how characters fit into the grand scheme, just as a general thing. But I made one anyway just now because it seems like a good idea because being able to easily refer back to character information is important!

But yeah, I'm definitely feeling a little bit like Netflix given that even though the upcoming story is the only one I've gone out of my way to plan... The various socials we've held have borne no fruit with regards to stories or connections, even when one of the ones long before the Holiday season began was framed as a chance to basically sell your skills and get jobs out of the network because... IC, that's what it's for. the nature of the network isn't strictly insider info or anything. (Maybe 5 people showed up outside of myself, despite scheduling it about two to three weeks in advance. A tavern night held by one of our members later that same month rounded up about 20 of our members in the same room. Gee, I wonder where their priorities are...)

Speaking as someone who runs quite a 'picky' linkshell and runs RP events and plots like I assume you're wanting to do, I really recommend reading up on the characters applying to the linkshell. Not to reject them if they're lore-breaking or anything, but having an idea of who is actually in your linkshell, what their character can do and what they are interested can really help in making an interesting and captivating plot for your members. For example, OoO has quite a few interested in void-hunting, so that's quite a common occurrence and we always have a full group of about 8 to 12 people showing for those sorts of things. You can also see how they write, how invested they are in getting that RP or if they're going to be another face in the crowd that only like sitting in taverns (of course nothing wrong with that, but your issue is that they're not using your linkshell as intended).

I just wanted to say, as a DM, you really don't want 20 people showing up to your plot-driven events. :V It can get sooo messy. Just trying to manage more than two can be troublesome, and in every FC/event I've been in, I feel that six to ten members mark showing up is very healthy. If you're going larger, you're going to need a second DM to keep up, especially if you're not very experienced. Not everyone can turn up to the events for whatever reason, and especially in a linkshell, they're not obligated to turn up either. They have priorities elsewhere, whether it's their friends or their FC. The linkshell's goal is just to provide a supplement criminal-based RP, no?

However, it's really hard not to envy the successes of public events and the turn-out for those, but the amount of effort from the organisers and the RPers are quite different compared to say, running a story plot that arcs over three different events. You set a date, advertise like hell and then hire a few bar staff and boom, done and you just monitor the tavern to make sure no one's causing drama. Plots take a lot of planning, the combat takes a lot of planning and even with all that, your members will throw a spanner in the works either IC or OOC or both. "Hey can my character do this?" or "Ah, I can't make Monday despite everyone else being able to, can you change it?" Different RPers will value these things differently, as others here have said. I prefer plot-driven RP but I can appreciate sitting down and having a drink and talking about my dark past in a random bar, too.

Just remember, social RP and plot RP are two different things so trying to compare them is a bit... yeah. I feel like... a large, engaging group = good social RP event, players walking away going "man, that was fun, my character got beat up/learned shit/earned gil, let's do that again" = a good plot event. Different rewards for different types of investment. As a fellow linkshell leader to another, it's really hard. Really hard, but worth it in the end when someone turns around to you and thanks you for the roleplay and starts turning up every week. The small victories are important. This got way too long, sorry. >.<

(01-05-2017 09:50 PM)zaviire Wrote: But yeah, I'm definitely feeling a little bit like Netflix given that even though the upcoming story is the only one I've gone out of my way to plan... The various socials we've held have borne no fruit with regards to stories or connections, even when one of the ones long before the Holiday season began was framed as a chance to basically sell your skills and get jobs out of the network because... IC, that's what it's for. the nature of the network isn't strictly insider info or anything. (Maybe 5 people showed up outside of myself, despite scheduling it about two to three weeks in advance. A tavern night held by one of our members later that same month rounded up about 20 of our members in the same room. Gee, I wonder where their priorities are...)

Aside: I'd debate that we've ever broken lore to a major degree as a group; the main issue in my opinion lies in social RP since in my experience social RP has hardly done anything to further a plot or make something happen. It probably goes better for other people in general but all it's really gotten for me is naptime, screwed up character arcs, and talking about the weather... Mostly the latter, especially when it comes to the social events I've tried my best to organize. Events which make me feel as if people have not read up on the lore of the LS at all, which is kind of saddening.

I'mma give it some thought (and also go back and read the group's lore). I love helping with these situations, so hopefully I can help find some possible solutions. ^^

To add, here's an example of how plots roll out in casual RP (or really, how I do em.):

Brinn was out on a date yesterday evening in Costa. Things were wrapping up for the scene and I knew I needed some sort of transition rather than just an awkward, "I'll be going then." "Okay, bye."

T: "So you'll be returning to Ul'dah, then?"
B: "Yeah, meetin' a potential renter late tonight. I'm not sure about this guy though. Can't get a bead on him."
T laughs. "Hope it's not an axe murderer."
B grins. "Now, as long as I /know/ I'm dealin' with an axe murderer, we're good. But this guy..." He shakes his head. "He makes me feel uneasy, an' I tend to trust my feelin's on this. But I can't point to any particular reason /not/ to rent him an office. An' too, it's our business to not look too hard into other's business. I mean, they'll be lookin' into our history an' know we'll be checkin' theirs, but we're not obvious about it. But this guy is a blank. Can't find out anythin' about him."
T: "I know some people in Ul'dah that can ask around without drawing attention to themselves."

The evening continues and Brinn promises to keep her up to date on what transpires.

An hour before, this plot didn't exist. Now I've got some, I dunno... mafia type? void mage? actually just an axe murderer? on my hands (all three? XD) and I have a new friend who has incidentally offered to join into the plot by helping with intrigue/intelligence. As I've done with these in the past, this can evolve into something that includes a number of other players. May wind it's way into some group or solo combat scenes. And along the way is a shit ton of character development.

The important part of this scene though was that my rp partner actually communicated back, asking questions and offering her own ideas. I've tried similar scenes with others, trying to get something rolling, and they just basically sit there and grunt at me. I mean, I get that they're Edgy Evilguy and only speak Brooding, but I... can't work with that. ; u ; I don't care if their character seems cool on paper or that they are in an LS made for thematic RP that we're both in; I'll move on. It's just tough when it seem 8/10 people I meet respond this way. >< (Had someone in a scene once spend most of the time rolling their eyes IC and just responding to prompts without emotion cause they are "just too cool". I like them as a person, but I won't go out of my way to rp with them again. lol.) That's okay though! There are still some who mesh well with my style and I treasure them. I'm here to have fun too, even as a DM of sorts, and trying to force people to play along isn't fun.